This past summer I interned in New York for Lucky Magazine for a life changing three months. I just returned for the first time a week ago, this is a photo taken from my most recent trip in Central Park.

In a city like this you are forced to evolve. You realize that it’s time to throw out everything you know about palm trees and sun block and make room for the three hundred square mile radius filled with enough restaurants to eat a different meal in for eight years straight.

You realize that you are apart of something so much bigger than yourself. Your own problems and concerns are no match for the millions of other people you pass daily, brushing shoulders and moving on, not even knowing whose life you just touched for a brief second in time.

You will never be alone. Everywhere you look at any hour of the day or night, someone is not too far behind. Someone with their own set of insecurities and quirks. Someone who is perhaps just as lost as you are, but you ask them for directions anyways. Maybe you are both going to the same place. Maybe you will never meet again. What matters most is that you realize you are apart of this booming livelihood and you are all in this together.

New York inspires me to push my level of fashion to the limit, to always be ahead of the curve, and most importantly to always be myself. When I’m in New York, I’m fashion fearless. I always love stepping out of my comfort zone and feeling like I’m a walking statue of a new tangible, obscure and stylish take on the current trends. It’s due to the fact that I view the entire city of New York as one huge runway, smack dab in the middle of fashion week, 365 days a year. There is so much inspiration you can grab from not only the city dwellers, but the city itself.

In this photo I am wearing an Alice by Alice Temperley gray leather jacket over a vintage skirt I transformed into a stapless, non-form fitting dress. The skirt is black with gold Egyptian statues and medallions spread along the bottom (and is absolutely breathtaking). I am also wearing pitch black American Apparel tights, with my We Who See black leather lace up flat boots. To top it all off (and to keep myself cozy) I added a charcoal gray American Apparel circle scarf (which, by the way, is my favorite accessory this fall).

Enjoy Chictopians, and remember, the most important rule in fashion is to feel confident and wear yourself through and through!